 Amen. Keep your place there in Romans chapter 7. So I love the book of Romans. I think that's why if you remember from the satellite ministry, I think that's the first book I ever preached through was the book of Romans. Just such great stuff in Romans. Romans chapter 7 especially. Paul here is talking about the law, sin, salvation through Jesus Christ. What does the law mean for us? He's talking about what's the point of the law, if the law is just there to kill us? Is it bad? Is it, you know, what's the purpose of the law? And he explains that in Romans chapter 7. The title of the sermon this morning is a very specific one. I don't think I've ever preached an entire sermon on this topic. But the title of the sermon this morning is the age of accountability. We're going to talk about the age of accountability this morning. This is a term that is used to talk about the doctrine of children being saved, children being condemned, many different religions, many different religions, you know, Christian type religions teach very different things about this. The term is not actually in the Bible, but we're going to talk about where the idea, it's a concept in the Bible. And we're going to look at that concept in the Bible this morning. So keep your place in Romans chapter 7. But first of all, just this idea of the age of accountability is what we're going to talk about this morning. Without this idea, meaning that there is an age, what does the term age of accountability mean? The term age of accountability means that there is an age that a child will reach where he is aware of his or her sin and then becomes condemned by that sin. This of course is contrasted by the doctrine of infant baptism which comes from the false doctrine of original sin. Meaning that you are born as a baby with original sin on you. Meaning you are guilty of Adam's sin. You are guilty of sin that somebody else has committed. That's against what the Bible teaches very clearly. And then of course that's where infant baptism comes from. So of course the Catholic Church founded in, you know, 310, 313 AD, whenever that was. They want to baptize babies. They want to have salvation be controlled by the church. They want to have, you have to bring your children to the church to give them salvation. And infant baptism was one of the methods or tools that they used to do that. It just became one of what they call the sacraments. Meaning you get salvation through this act which the Bible teaches nothing about. But basically even Protestants and Lutherans which I grew up in talk about it's the same thing. They believe salvation comes to a child through baptism. They don't call it works because they call it a means of grace. Meaning it's the way God gives that child grace so they can still claim the gift. They can still claim free grace but you have to do something to get the grace. They call it a means of grace. So without this age of accountability you have to buy into infant baptism, original sin, all these things. Which, you know, if you follow that through logically that a child and infant, let's just, we'll start with infants because it gets a little bit more complicated as we go into child. But if you follow what that means through that a baby has to be baptized in order to get grace, salvation, then you have to come to the next logical conclusion. Look it's not like five steps down the linear chain. It's the very next logical conclusion of what happens to a baby that is not baptized if they should die. And, you know, here's the thing. The Catholics are changing on this as are the Protestants changing on this. St. Augustine, St. Augustine from, you know, the original Catholic church back in 300 A.D. and the other fathers of the church believed that unbaptized infants, they taught that unbaptized infants share the same fate as the damned. They go to hell just like everybody else. Of course they would say that the hell that the unbaptized baby goes to was a lesser punishment, which that is biblical. There are different levels of punishment in hell. The Bible is clear about that. But they did teach that logical conclusion that if a baby is not baptized and that baby should die, they would go to hell. Now the Catholic church is changing on this over the, you know, over history. Eight hundred years after Augustine, there was a French philosopher named Peter Abelard that said dead infants that died unbaptized went to a cooler place on the edge of hell. And this was a place that he called limbo, right? And this is a Catholic church also grabbed onto this philosophy of limbo. And then in 2007, the Vatican announced in 2007 the results of a papal investigation on the concept of limbo. And that they changed their church doctrine to state that unbaptized babies can go to heaven, by the way. They're not definitive about it instead of getting stuck somewhere between heaven and hell. Really the answer that a Catholic will give you is we don't really know. It is the answer that most Catholics will give you. So it went from basically hell to limbo to maybe heaven, all right? Because look as people just get more liberal and they won't even follow their own false doctrines anymore. I mean the Lutherans, the Lutherans are also changing on this. If you go and look up this question on Lutheran doctrinal websites, whether it be Concordia stuff or LCMS that I grew up in, you will read pages upon pages upon pages of supposed answers to this. But here's the bottom line. They're really what the Lutheran will tell you today is that there is no answer to this, all right? But if you go back to the Lutheran confessions and even Lutherans years and years ago, the Lutheran confessions say that baptism is necessary for salvation, meaning unbaptized children, babies, they are in hell. And look, I have had, you have the advantage of having an ex-Lutheran on your hands here. Not only was I an ex-Lutheran, but the culture that I grew up in was very Lutheran Catholic. I remember controversies of people that we know from 50, 60 years ago of the Catholic Church not doing a burial for, we're not talking about hundreds of years ago, not doing a burial for a child that wasn't baptized. Why? Because that child is in hell and they weren't going to do the burial for that. And there's a lot of hard feelings and all these types of things. I'm about that. But that's been happening for ever since the beginning of the Catholic Church. For Lutherans, I have had Lutheran pastors that were strict doctrinal Lutheran pastors tell me because they follow through this doctrine. At least they believe the doctrine, right? At least, I mean, give them that. Like, if they're going to believe a false doctrine, at least they believe the whole thing. I have had Lutheran pastors tell me that the most fundamental Lutheran pastors tell me that, yes, aborted babies are in hell. I mean, it's crazy to think about it. Now, that never really sat with me. That never really sat with me. But if you believe that baptism gives you faith, that is the conclusion that you must come to for babies, for children. Turn to Acts 8 in verse 37. Look, if baptism saves you, then without it, babies do not have salvation because that's the only way that a baby could get salvation. Of course, we know that baptism is not of salvation. Baptism does not save you. Baptism is something that happens after salvation. It is something that we do out of obedience to God to show that willingness to walk in newness of life in that Christian faith, something that we what? What does Paul say again and again in Romans chapter 7? Something that we should do. Something that we should do. That's one of the greatest words in the book of Romans is just, should, should, should. You should do these things. But it doesn't mean if you get saved by trusting on Jesus that you're automatically everyone's just going to do all these things. You turn into a robot and, you know, God just takes over your life and you're a robot now. It's like you should do these things out of obedience. If he loved me, you know, obey my commandments. You know, if we want to show our love towards God. But this is why they have to take Acts chapter 8 verse 37 out of every modern Bible version. You think, oh, it's just an accident that they took this verse out. Literally, this verse is missing from most of the modern Bible versions. Look at verse number 36. It says they went on their way and they saw, so Philip had just preached the gospel to this Ethiopian eunuch. He had just told him about Christ and preached the gospel. And look at verse 36. As they went on their way, they came under a certain water and the eunuch said, see here is water. What doth hinder me to be baptized? The eunuch literally is saying, Philip, there's water here. Why is there anything that would stop me from getting baptized? Is there anything that can hinder me? And then all the modern Bible versions just go straight to verse number 38. And if you look open your NIV and look at it, it will literally go from verse 36 to 38. You think people would be like, whoa, what happened to 37? Because 37 says this. And Philip said, if thou believest with all thine heart, thou mayest. And he answered and said, I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God. He's basically confessing with his mouth that he believes the gospel that was just preached to him. Now, I mean, let's go up to a baby and ask him, do you believe in the baby? It's ridiculous. You have to shut off your brain to think this way. So baptism is something that we do after salvation out of obedience to God. It doesn't give us faith. It doesn't save us. You want to really confuse a Catholic priest or a Lutheran pastor? Don't even ask them a question about unbaptized babies. Ask them about an unbaptized two-year-old. You're at some event and you happen to run into a Lutheran pastor and you want to really confuse them. What happens to an unbaptized three-year-old that gets in a car accident and God forbid dies? What happens? They're going to be like, they're going to give you some long non-answer and maybe recommend a book to you is what they're going to do. Because you can't believe the doctrine that they believe without believing that that child is now in hell. This is why, by the way, this is why two of my children, when I was in the Lutheran church and my children were born, they were baptized in the hospital. And the most conservative Lutheran pastors that we had were like, good job. Why? Because why risk it? I mean, if this is the only way they end up in heaven and you're going to wait three weeks or six weeks or whatever it is to get a special outfit and get a cake and all these things and risk damnation for your child for that six weeks, I'm like, are you nuts? Are you crazy? I'm not taking that kind of risk with my kids. But then we started to have liberal Lutheran pastors as time went on. And one, for the last child that we did that with, the one pastor was like, why are you doing this? Don't you want to have a party and have people over? And I'm like, are you crazy? Do you even know what your own doctrine teaches? But he didn't, right? He didn't. He didn't believe his own false doctrine. All right, so look, enough confusion. All right, enough confusion. Let's look at the Bible this morning and see what the Bible says about children, about children. Are they condemned? When are they considered sinners? If there is an age of accountability, what is that age? What is that age? Let's look at it this morning. Let's just look at the Bible. Go to Romans chapter 7. Go to Romans chapter 7, or you're in Romans chapter 7. So like I said, the phrase age of accountability is not in the Bible, but the concept is laid out pretty clearly in a couple of places. I'll show you both of them this morning. Look at Romans chapter 7. Look at verse number 7. Let's start out here. Paul's talking about the law. He's like, what's the purpose of the law? If we're saved by grace through faith, what does the law do for me? Is it there to just beat me up, to kill me? What's it all about? What shall we say then? Is the law sin? He says, God forbid. Nay, I had not known sin, but by the law. So he's saying at some point through the law, he knew sin. All right? So how did he know sin? Through the law. All right? That's an important point as we go to the second point or later on in the sermon. Just remember that that Paul did not know sin except through the law. For I had not known lust, except the law had said thou shalt not covet. But sin, taking occasion by the commandment, wrought in me all manner of concupiscence. For without the law sin was dead. Concupiscence, even though I can't pronounce it, means lust, covetousness. For without the law sin was dead. Now here's really the key verse right here. So he's saying sin showed him or the law showed him his sin is what he said so far. Though by through the law he recognized his sin. All right? Without the law he didn't recognize his sin. Now look at verse number nine. This pretty much destroys, this verse right here pretty much destroys the idea of original sin in general. For I was alive without the law once. Isn't that interesting? Now look the law, the law is we have the law written in our heart and we also have the law of the Bible. In Romans 2.15 you know Paul's explaining that you know what about you know the Jews he explains in the first part of Romans he explains you know what advantage hath the Jew. He's like if everybody can get saved what advantage hath the Jew. Well the Jews they had the oracles of God they had the Bible. That's an advantage that they had. All right? But then he says in Romans 2.15 that even the Gentiles did the things you know according to the law because God had written the law in their hearts their conscience. He explains that every man has a conscience which is the law written in his heart. But Paul it's interesting he says in verse number nine here he says I was alive without the law once. If original sin is true this statement can't be in the Bible. He's saying there was a point where I was alive. Look the wages of sin is death meaning as soon as sin is in your life you're dead. The wages you owe death. You deserve death but he's saying I was alive without the law once. When was that? When was that? He's saying there was a point where I was alive without the law but when the commandment came sin revived and I died. So before he knew the law he was alive. This is what Paul is saying. So there's a point that Paul was alive there's a point that everyone was alive and then the law came they recognized their conscience they recognized the Bible and they died at that point. For sin taking occasion by the what the commandment deceived me and by it slew me. So the law shows you your sin and as soon as you recognize that you die the wages of sin is death. Wherefore the law is holy the commandment is holy and just and good. So literally the law shows you your need for salvation. The law shows you that you're dead it kills you and it shows you your need for the Savior. That is the point of the law. So he's like no the law is holy. The law is just meaning it's fair. It's fair. Okay look that's the first point that's the really the those verses right there are just the real clear explanation of before you understand the law you're alive. This is a very clear explanation from the Bible directly on this idea of the concept of the age of accountability. But look turn to Romans chapter three just a few chapters back. The age of accountability can also be explained clearly in the concept of the gospel itself. Because in order to be saved step one of getting someone to believe the gospel to believe that they need a Savior and this is why by the way most people that are teaching original all these people that are teaching original sin all these people that are teaching infant baptism they believe a false gospel. Because the idea of you know this age that you're alive before the law comes in is actually found in the gospel too. If you look at Romans chapter three look at verse number 10. Look this is step one in giving someone the gospel is that they understand that they're a sinner. As it is written there's none righteous no not one. Verse 23 says for all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. Everyone knows that you cannot be saved unless you understand that. You can I mean there's no way that you can be saved unless you understand that you are a sinner. It doesn't even make logical sense because I mean that's also why it's one of the simplest things for people to accept. People that will get to you know the end of the gospel or the midpoint of the gospel and say well you start talking about you know Jesus and Jesus was God and Jesus was sinless and Jesus rose from the dead and all this and they're like I don't know about that. 99.9% of people will accept this first part of the gospel that they are a sinner. I can count the people that I have met after talking to thousands of people. I can count the people that have told me that they're not sinners probably on one hand because that is just a very it's like the simplest part of the gospel. Just you're a sinner you're guilty and the wages of that sin is death that's kind of step two but the point is if you don't believe that if you don't understand that you can't be saved. So just this idea that a child must be old enough to understand that what they do is wrong that they have done things that are wrong it's kind of written into the gospel folks just the concept that there is an age where you can understand that. Obviously a one-year-old has no idea they're just look a one-year-old is just going around or a two-year-old is just going around and look they're doing what they do. That's why they call it the terrible twos they're going around they do what they do they're just tearing stuff up and look they're starting to understand consequences they're starting to learn those things hopefully through their parents but the point is before they even understand that there is right and there is wrong and they've committed sin they can't be saved so there is there is an age of accountability they're alive at that point they're alive at that point that's what Paul is talking about. So the question is okay pastor sounds good when is it though that's that's the question right when's that age of accountability what's that what's that date you know what's that mark I need to put on the calendar for my children so there's a few points that the bible kind of leads us to there's no magical date for every single person I believe it's probably a little different for every child out there depending on their circumstances but let me just show you a couple concepts again from the bible to explain about when this is turn to Genesis chapter three turn to Genesis chapter three so the first thing that we can look at is you know when shame starts to appear in children because at some point shame will begin to appear in kids look at Genesis chapter three and verse number six here we saw here we see the the fall of man we see when when Eve first eats of the the fruit of the the tree of the knowledge of good and evil and they that man first sins against God all right look at verse number six it says in the woman saw that the tree was good for food and that it was pleasant to the eyes and the tree to be desired to make one wise she took of the fruit thereof and did eat so she sins this is the first sin and gave also under her husband with her and he did eat and look at verse number seven the very first thing that happens after they sin did they willingly sin against God and the eyes of them both were opened and what they knew they were naked and they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves apron apron so as soon as they had sinned as soon as they had sinned and they knew they had sinned that shame entered right away and they recognized that they were uncovered they were naked there is they didn't have that shame before they had no knowledge that there was anything shameful about having no clothes on until they were sinners all right so look this is a good kind of analogy a good kind of picture this is why young children can run around you know with no clothes on after a bath or whatever and just have no shame about it they just don't care they're just like whatever there's nothing wrong here they have they have no that shame of sin is not with them at that point now look hopefully this is something that's taught by their parents you know soon nobody likes going over to those people's house that thinks it's cute where their kids are running around with no clothes on all the time you know but the point is there will be a time even if parents don't teach that there will be a time when those children get to an age of you know my kids haven't been young for a long time but like five six seven years old where they're just going to be like yeah they're not going to do that anymore because they're going to start to realize like hey I don't have any clothes on and this is shameful but my point is that a child that is taught that that is you know not something that they should do is going to be able to recognize those things much earlier by the way and that's kind of a concept that we're going to see this morning as well so just that shame that sin brings is is kind of a good key or a good measuring stick for us as parents of when this age of accountability kind of comes in when kids can kind of recognize shame recognize you know what is right and what is wrong it's going to be around that same time when they're when they're young children you know when they're younger than you know seven six years old now turn to Deuteronomy chapter 31 let me further back this up all right further back this up look at Deuteronomy chapter 31 and look at verse number nine so the first one is just like when they start to recognize shame you can tell that this is a clue in their lives right you can tell that this is a clue that they're reaching that point where they can start to recognize their own sin look at Deuteronomy chapter 31 look at verse number nine here's another clue for us the bible says this the bible says and moses wrote this law and delivered it under the priest the sons of levi which bear the ark of the covenant of the lord and at the end of every seven years in this solemn nitty of the year of release in the feast of tabernacles when all israel has come to appear before the lord thy god in the place which he shall choose thou shall read this law before all israel in their hearing so every seven years they are to read the law to the people this is just to make sure that like hey you know if people aren't studying this stuff on their own if people aren't you know doing what they're supposed to do and learning the law on their own everybody's going to get the law every seven years all right look at the verse number 12 it says gather the people together this is one of the reasons we're a family integrated church one of the places in the bible that it teaches that children should be listening to the law as well gather the people together men and women and children and thy stranger that is within thy gates that they may hear that they may learn and fear the lord your god and observe to do all the words of this law and again look what it says here and that their children which have not what which have not known anything may hear it's saying this is where what is when was paul live again before he knew so this is one of the ways that they know they're going to read the bible to them that they may hear and learn to fear the lord your god why would why would they have to fear because sin is shown to them through the law and now they have to fear the wrath of god they need to be saved see so this is how they know this is how they know as long as you live in the land whether you go over jordan to possess it so how often are they supposed to read the law every seven years so let's think this through for a second let's say worst case scenario the law is read and then the next day a child is born that child is going to be what about seven years old almost seven years old one day before seven years old when the law is is read the next time meaning that you know worst case scenario we're talking about you know seven years old you know so it makes sense right around that time of shame and understanding sin all these types of things so a child born the next day that doesn't hear the law for what another seven years obviously a child that is you know born at that time would hear the law when they were two three and the seven years later they'd hear it when they were nine or whatever so seven years eight years nine years this is a good gauge is all i'm telling you why they decided to read the law every seven years and children are mentioned twice so that why so that they may know the law they may know at that point here's a third point turn to second Corinthians chapter 11 second Corinthians chapter 11 so first of all we see that when shame comes in is a good indication of you know when you know children are starting to understand their sin the second one is the law was read to people including the children every seven years all right meaning you know we know that there's not you know going to be kids out there that haven't heard the law you know in 10 or 15 years i mean they've heard the law read every seven years here's a third point we can get some clues we're looking at clues to figure out like around what time you know is this age of accountability that the bible conceptually talks about look at second Corinthians chapter 11 verse number two paul says for i am jealous over you with godly jealousy for i have espoused you to one husband and that i may present you as a chaste virgin to christ he says but i fear less by any means as the serpent beguiled eve through his subtlety so your mind should be corrupted from the simplicity that is in christ what he's saying here is that the gospel itself he's talking about them being saved through jesus christ he's saying the gospel is simple he's like don't let somebody come and complicate this whole thing you know the through subtle means and all these different types of things he's like this this concept of the gospel of jesus christ is very simple look the simplest concept in the bible is the gospel the simplest concept in the bible and look if you go out soul winning you will hear that from people all the time you will explain the gospel to somebody who's been in a pentecostal church or a catholic church or some other Protestant or denomination of some kind that's teaching all this complicated you know you can never really know what all the different things you have to do to go to heaven all these things that you just give somebody the gospel straight from the bible and they're just like man i've just never had anyone explain it so simply before people will say that all the time to you because the gospel is simple you're a sinner you deserve to go to hell jesus paid for those sins and if you trust only on him you're saved you're sealed it's done i mean that's very simple you know it's so simple that a child can understand it doesn't this make sense it's so simple that look i've seen so many examples of this by the way it's so simple that a child raised in church according to the bible that that listens to bible preaching whose mom and dad read the bible to them whose whose mom is just reading them the bible every single day look they will be able to understand these concepts many times way before the age of seven because as soon like it's the simplest thing in the bible on purpose and what i always say to people when you're out preaching the gospel and somebody says that it's just like it's like just this this sigh of relief comes over them they're like boy that is really simple and and i always say to them i'm like well would it really be fair would it really match your conscience if the gospel was so complicated only the smartest people could understand it if the gospel was such a complicated you know thing that only the smartest people could understand the gospel only the theologians could understand it you know the the doctors of you know whatever could understand it no it's it's the paul says in second Corinthians 11 it's simple it's simplicity there's a lot of complicated things in the bible there's a lot of doctrine in the bible there's a lot of prophecy in the bible that we're looking at through a glass darkly the gospel is not one of those things the gospel is very simple and it's people and false teachers that make it complicated right look these concepts of sin and of hell turn the Proverbs chapter 13 by the way and and of hell and punishment they're very simple concepts and by the way this is why the bible is so serious about disciplining your children because when you are disciplining your children look it has to do it it's tied to their salvation unless don't misquote me on that it's not how they get saved but it it it leads them down the proper road to where they will understand the gospel look at Proverbs chapter 13 and look at verse number 24 this is why you know when the bible talks about disciplining your children properly it's so serious about it you know I was like well you know what's the big deal it's a really big deal look at Proverbs 13 24 it says he that spareeth his rod everyone's like spare the rod spoil the child that's not what the bible says that's like made up niv version or whatever that is or just you know some you know some rip off watered down version of what the bible is trying to say it says he that spareeth the rod hateeth his son it's like if you don't spank your children we're not talking about child abuse we're talking about spanking and physically correcting your children in a loving way it says if you don't do that because everyone's like oh I just I don't want to be mean and all this oh you hate your son I'm sorry I don't know how many Christians I've met that just they won't do it they will not spank their children they won't I don't want to be mean they they just like they're they're weak the man is is weak and he just doesn't want to hurt anyone's feelings it's like hey but you hate your son no I don't I love my son well the bible says you hate him remember love and hate is what you do not how you feel so if you don't spank your children you hate your son you hate your children like man that's a really extreme statement but it says he that love with him chasing with him be times look if you love your children when they are young and look I'm going to tell you something I don't spank my kids now you know which is you know I'm I'm supposed to be an example to you I don't I never spank my kids after they were I think 10 years old but when they were little kids like they got spanked all the time but I mean I didn't spank like like you should be done spanking them by the time they're 10 if you're like oh man I got an 18 year old and like I just got to keep spanking him like there's a problem here you probably didn't spank him when he was one two three years old and now you know you're not going to go spank your 22 year old or whatever it's weird I mean I guess you know and look people have different opinions on when you should stop spanking your kids but like whenever I thought like okay this is going to be weird you know I kind of stop spanking my kids and you know like there's other things you can punish them with when they get to be a little older but you know you know you know I'm kind of listening to my conscience there a little bit all right so I mean that's just me that's how I did it everyone may differ a little bit there but the point I'm trying to get you to understand is this is directly tied to them understanding the gospel you don't believe me turn to Proverbs 23 turn to Proverbs 23 look at verse number 14 Proverbs 23 look at verse number 14 you explain explain if disciplining your children properly by spanking them doesn't have anything to do with the gospel explain this statement to me then look at Proverbs 23 and verse number 14 Proverbs 23 it says thou shalt beat him with the rod and shall deliver his soul from hell you're like what first of all again not talking about child abuse not talking about you know you know it's just it's talking about physically spanking punishing your children and it says you will deliver them from hell you say what do you mean it says you know what it's talking about it's saying what the message that you're giving them if you don't spank your children is that sin is no big deal the message that you're giving them when you they do things wrong and then you're like hey uh stop it one two i'm going to count to three two and a half two point eight and like i mean how many times have you done this i'm going to count to 50 you know like look the kids you know what you're doing or i'm going to put you in time out the kids are like what you're doing is you're literally teaching your kids if you do all these other methods of you know worldly discipline what these other methods are doing is teaching your kids that consequences aren't real you're teaching your kids like oh that is a two-year-old recognize that he's a sinner no but a two-year-old recognizes he if he does something that dad told him not to do that he's going to get spanked on his bottom and it's going to hurt it's going to sting okay and he's going to recognize just this simple concept of what consequences that way when this idea of the gospel comes in what's the first step sin next step consequences serious consequences you know like god's not going to put you in time out okay when you die as a sinner and you have not accepted the lord jesus christ god's not going to be like well one two he's no it's it's hell and that's for eternity and it's real so that's why the bible is so serious in pro verse 13 and pro verse chapter 23 about telling you like look you better discipline your kids you better spank them you know when they need to be spanked you spank them you're like but i gotta spank them 12 times a day do it that's what needs to be done look and look i'm telling you if you spank them when they're young you don't have to spank them when they're 10 it's just it just works that way because you raise them right and then they move in the right direction you know the bible actually works not only is this going to lead them to understand the first couple steps of the gospel it actually works the bible actually works folks you want to raise godly children they want to just they want to serve the lord with their own life one day this is how you do it i don't care if it hurts your feelings i don't care if you're weak you're like you know you're you're a weak man and you can't stand to see your kids you know shed a tear whatever look and here's another thing just from personal experience we actually had a foster child for uh i think it was over two years we had a foster child and so we had a child in our house we had one young child and then we had a foster child and i've literally i've literally seen this scientific experiment play out because we could not spank the foster child that was the rule and look we followed those rules we followed the proper rules with the foster child so one child we could not spank and our own child like that it just drove the social worker crazy she'd come in like talk to us about you know come do checkups or whatever on how the child was doing and of course um with our oldest child um we spanked him and we just told the the social worker look it's not illegal to spank your kids folks you're in a grocery store whatever and it was like oh you know it's not illegal it's not against the law it's not against the law to spank your children right i mean i don't think i ever spanked my kids in public but i mean i don't know maybe my wife has i'm not sure but the point is that it's not illegal and the social worker say do you spank your own children it's like well absolutely and well i just i i don't care what you i have to i mean i didn't say it that way but like you have no authority over my own family but with uh we took classes on time out on how to do time out and how to do all this stuff we couldn't even stand them in the corner remember we have to stand in the corner when you get in trouble in school or whatever i'm sure they don't do that anymore but we couldn't even do that it was just time out and first of all nobody does time out correctly we took like a whole class on time out but time out's a joke time out's a joke that they just don't take it seriously ooh you maybe sit in a chair ooh you know i mean the thing and here's another thing with time out and doing time out properly when the foster child would do time out we would put him in time out and look if they mess up or they do something then the time out starts over this could be a long drawn out process for like half an hour an hour look some kid does something like our child did something wrong dad comes home this is what the child did dad goes in spanking hug you understand what you did wrong hug let's go play ball like seven seconds i mean it's just it's the perfect solution to the problem and what does it do it just shows like hard consequences look it doesn't mean that you know i don't love you anymore and and we always talked about that and and it was it was done i don't like spanking you i don't like being at work and then not getting to see you all day long and i gotta come home and i gotta give you a spanking but you know what that's the way it's gonna be and then we make up and we go throw the ball around i mean that's you know it's just over just like that and you're back to that uh relationship again but the point i'm trying to get you to understand is that this is teaching children at a very young age that things are wrong things are right and the things that are wrong have consequences and that is the first step to the gospel this is why a kid that is that is in church that's being taught the bible that is having the bible played out in his life that is loving parents that are actually chastising him actually spanking him they will get they will get saved at a young age because they'll start asking you questions they'll hear the pastor talking about the gospel constantly they're out soul winning with you and you're preaching the gospel to people constantly and they're going to be like hey you know um at some point when they're five six seven years old i don't know when that is with with different kids but they're going to start asking you questions like uh i think i need to be saved um how do i know if i'm going to heaven all these things and guess what then you preach them the gospel and you're like the first part of the gospel sin the sin that you have son you know the sin that you do yeah i know dad i know i have that sin that has consequences the consequences for that is hell oh yeah yeah i've heard you tell this before and it's just like it's just going to be easy they'll just accept it like like a like a perfect key fits a perfect walk so it's very simple kids raising church reading the bible hearing the bible preached will get saved many times younger than seven years old i've seen it many times which means there are no danger literally no danger at all i mean look then there's kids sometimes nine or ten years old that have never been in church this is the other side never been in church maybe they didn't have loving parents that were disciplining them properly teaching them what was right what was wrong look we're finding kids out there today they never even heard of jesus who's jesus they don't know look yeah it was it was hard to find this type of thing five plus years ago now you're starting to see kids all the time don't know who jesus is no idea look many times these kids are going to have a harder time understanding the gospel many times and also by the time they're nine or ten years old they've got other ideas forming in their head already see we ran into this wednesday or sunday i can't remember just a couple soul winning times before we ran into these kids and uh jacob approached these kids they were about nine ten years old maybe eleven years old about about jacob's age maybe a little bit younger completely uninterested already already what was it with them well they were just into all these video games that they had sitting in front of them like they're sitting outside in the sun playing video games which is you know another sermon in itself but the point is is just like you see they're not in church they don't know the bible they never heard of jesus they they don't have a conviction in their heart about sin or the consequences for that completely uninterested in knowing how to go to heaven because i mean that was the question hey do you guys want to know how to go to heaven you guys know if you're going to heaven don't care busy so you see the importance of you know raising children properly when we look at this idea of you know the knowledge of sin uh you know brings death upon them turn to matthew chapter 19 see the bible folks just to conclude this morning the bible has all the answers so anybody that is telling you well there's not really a good answer to that well especially when it comes to salvation look at matthew chapter 19 look at verse number 14 this also makes this verse actually makes sense and the catholics and the lutherns especially will misuse this verse talking about you know how you know children need to be baptized look at verse number 14 of matthew chapter 19 he says but jesus said suffer the little children and forbid them not to come on to me for of such is the kingdom of heaven he's talking about their their innocent catholics and lutherns will say oh yeah you know infants can believe and they'll use this verse you're just like what are you talking about first of all those little children little children like so they're changing their doctrine on babies they're they're they're liberalizing their doctrine just like they're liberalizing their doctrine on everything they're liberalizing their doctrine on babies but they literally have no answer for little children at all so like i said if you want to stump a priest there there's your question right there but the bible has all the answers you say you know that the theoretical question you get asked all the time is like what about the child in africa the bible has all the answers there's there's what about the child in africa there's three there's three possibilities for the child that grew up in south american jungle or whatever you want to say the first possibility is that you know that two-year-old three-year-old child dies early dies young is in heaven that's that's possibility number one then you're like well okay that child grows up to be a pagan unbeliever like their their their relatives or their family or whatever they grew up in you know and then they they're gonna if they don't seek the truth they're gonna pay for their own sin their own what their own actual sins they commit not some original sin that was put on them that's fake doctrine right but look there's another third option is that they have the conscience in their heart and they seek the truth and god promises that they'll find the truth in that case and that's what missionaries are for that's what soul winners are for that's what we're doing we've got soul winning we're we're finding the people that are seeking we're finding those people and we'll talk look there's too many non-thinking people out there is the problem we'll talk about this tonight but when somebody when any church or any spiritual leader of any kind or any false teacher or any teacher of any kind let me just say it that way tells you that you know regarding salvation that there's just no real answer or or that here's two words that the Lutheran church will teach this it's a paradox they'll talk about salvation is a paradox a paradox is like it's a one and a zero at the same time it's like they're like you know in quantum theory right it's like no salvation is simple it is not a paradox the the catholic things I was reading last week about this says it's a quandary when people start using this word these words around you talking about salvation and the gospel or what they think is the gospel a quandary means it's perplexing or uncertain the gospel is not uncertain it is simple you must depart these teachings because the gospel is simple for everyone so simple that a small child can understand it a child of four five six seven years old can understand the gospel very simple it's for everyone so the age of accountability it's not a definition in the bible but it is a very clear concept laid out in the bible and look you just have to have the right gospel in order to understand it let's bow our heads and have a word of prayer